Davos 07: a new star is born

Move over Sharon Stone and Bono. A small, grey-haired man wearing a grey suit and a slightly startled expression was the unlikely star of today's Davos.

A session on "making green pay" starring Sir Nicholas Stern, the former government economist and author of last year's groundbreaking report into climate change, was standing room only. In spite of being held in the hotel's largest meeting room, an orderly queue of not-too happy conference goers were made to stand outside for 20 minutes until they were told to go away as the numbers inside already presented a fire risk.

There were five others speaking at the event but the real star of the show - if the number of reporters huddling around him afterwards and delegates regaling him with their own plans to save the world are anything to go by - was the man who has spent a lifetime of anonymity (teaching Peter Mandelson does not count) before writing a report that told us all how bad we are. He called refusal to pay for the environmental damage we do "the biggest market failure the world has ever seen".

Where the star of Basic Instinct two years ago annoyed organisers by making sudden public calls for donations to her favourite charities, Stern argued for a higher taxation to help defeat the menace of global warming. Then, 64% of the audience made up supported his contention that carbon taxes do not do more harm than good.

It should gladden the heart of conference founder and president, Prof Klaus Schwab, who has heeded calls to change the tone of this year's Davos after a string of celeb-dominated encounters. Asked why Sharon et al had fallen off the guest list this year, he said in his inimitable accent: "We didn't feel in need of an accelerator of our issues."